Discussion Rubrics

Description

While faculty might hope that students can “just discuss” a topic online with little or no support, Beckett, Amaro‐Jiménez, and Beckett (2010) found that “even doctoral students may need explicit grading instructions, and therefore provide rubrics and sample responses while not stifling creativity” (p. 331). Rubrics provide clear expectations for students regarding how an assignment, that can otherwise be subjective, will be graded. In addition to providing learner support, they can be especially helpful to instructors since they clearly state the goals for the assignment and facilitate a systematic way to assign grades. Some faculty members also employ the assistance of a teaching assistant and with multiple graders, the potential for inconsistent grading becomes high. Rubrics can help minimize that potential risk.

Baker (2011) notes that it is helpful for the instructor to be very clear in their rubric, using both quantitative and qualitative elements. Concerning discussions, instructors can advise students that higher quality comments will likely have certain features like referring to the text, lecture or other sources. A rubric can contain criteria about original posts, but also replies to other students (“to simply agree or disagree with other members is not sufficient”). He defines a ‘substantive post’ as well-constructed, thoughtful, independent comment of one paragraph or more. He recommends setting up a word limit as well; for him, a “C” grade level comment would consist of 125 words. It is not advised to always adopt a certain word count; the scope of the discussion will always depend on the learning objectives of the module and other activities.

Pelz (2004, in Cranney et al., 2011) recommend that students ask these questions to themselves as they post: (1) Is the information accurate? (2) Is your post relevant to the topic under discussion? (3) Does your post answer the questions required? (4) Does your post teach something new or apply a concept in a new way? (5) Have you added to the academic atmosphere of this course? These questions then serve as categories for a rubric.

Popular Trends in Corporate Training: Gamification
Learning is a joy for some, but misery for most, especially those who have completed their many years of study and reached a job. Training is, however important and one of the best ways in which you can keep your staff up to date, engaged, and ready for change.

Making training fun: Gamification

· The first step to any training is the return on investment. ROI, in this case will be how much the company on the whole and the participants, in particular gain from it. They are, for the most part intangible, but should help with the overall output and performance.

· The next step is to make sure that the game is not just about the game. Having fun is second priority, the most important thing, is to impart skills and update knowledge. So the participants should be thorough with the content, the game, points, and prizes come second.

· Make sure that the game based sessions actually have positive outputs. At the end of the year, your dashboards will have to show results, this can be because of the game or other teamwork related effects that it has had.